Cast of Thousands Fails to Generate “Plain English” Order

October 9, 2008

Here’s another one from the archives:

[The Court asked counsel to] prepare a "plain English" version of the injunctive order, which the Court could then substitute for the somewhat convoluted order still in place. . . . In response, [counsel] submitted to the Court on February 15, 2006, a proposed new order of mind-numbing turgidness and prolixity, the very first sentence of which extends for nearly four pages. . . . .

Would it be asking too much to ask counsel to make another attempt at a new version?

(Emphasis added.) We’ve seen "briefs" before that are staggeringly long, but a four-page opening sentence is an achievement to stand alongside the Pyramids, or at least to be buried next to that one stumpy pyramid that sits off to the side. Hey, this might be the problem: there were so many attorneys involved that it took the first five pages of the opinion just to print the list of counsel. Although one suspects maybe the court did that on purpose, just to make a point.